


Memories

by the5leggedCricket



Category: Humans (TV)
Genre: Angst, Episode 8, Episode Related, Gen, Season/Series 01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-24
Updated: 2015-10-24
Packaged: 2018-04-27 20:07:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5062291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the5leggedCricket/pseuds/the5leggedCricket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hobb takes an interest in Leo and the secrets his synth-like brain has to offer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memories

**Author's Note:**

> First of all, in this story Hobb doesn't know who the fifth synth, Beatrice, is.  
> Secondly, please ignore the giant plothole. I tried to fix it, actually did fix it, and then decided that I liked this version better.  
> Last but not least, thanks to my awesome beta, [ambrosius](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ambrosius). All remaining mistakes are definitely my own.

“Now, imagine a machine that could think and feel, but still be controlled like a regular synthetic. I can build on David's work. I can create conscious machines like Fred, but mine... will be obedient.”

Frances was interested, Edwin could tell. She tried to keep her face blank, but the lack of any serious reprimand was telling. He’d been playing her all along, and now that he was laying his cards on the table, she couldn’t even tell him off for it. Especially not after Fred’s little... display. The pieces were falling into place exactly like he’d planned. Except for…

“I just need a little more time. There’s one more Synth. Without it, the code to make conscious Synths isn’t complete.”

“What—”

“I’m tracking it down. It shouldn’t take much longer to find it, and then we can test the programme, and dispose of them all. Until then, we can just power them down, so they’re out of our way.”

“And what of the hybrid? I don’t imagine you can turn him off…”

“Oh no, I’ve got plans for Leo.”

She gave him a stern glare in response and told him to keep her updated. On everything. Edwin nodded and gave her a thin smile. Perfect. Despite what she liked to believe, he was not under her control. He’d feed her little bits of information, just enough to keep up the pretense that he was doing her bidding, but everyone in the lab knew to report to him and him only. And if shit hit the fan, she would be the first to take the fall.

He turned back towards the window once she left. Finally left alone with David’s legacy. The time for hiding was over.

 -oO-

Being moved somewhere without having a say in it or even knowing where they were moving him to made Leo feel helpless. But watching his siblings being powered down and dragged in the other direction was definitely worse.

“No, don’t! Maxie’s dying. You’re killing him. No—no, don’t. Don’t!"

The… nurses? Scientists? The _assistants_ simply ignored him and wheeled him through blindingly white halls to a room filled with even more whiteness. They pushed him towards the centre, next to a bunch of empty desks and tables, and then left him alone, tied down and handcuffed. He spared a moment to think, “Hopefully I don’t need to pee,” before letting the seriousness of the situation dawn on him.

What he’d feared for so many years had finally happened. His family had been caught. They were separated from each other, where he couldn’t protect them, and undoubtedly being subjected to all sorts of tests. They would be treated as synths, machines, or something intriguing as if they were a puzzle to be solved regardless of whether they wanted to be or not. He’d failed and broken his promise of keeping them safe.

He let his head fall back and breathed in deeply. Just then, the door opened and Hobb entered.

“You can’t do this. You can’t keep us here! Let us go or I swear to God I’ll—”

“Or you’ll do nothing. I’ve told you before, you don’t exactly have a lot of rights. You’re not really in a position to throw around any threats.”

Leo ignored him. “What did you do to them?”

Hobb waved a hand nonchalantly in the air. “Don’t worry about them. They’re fine, just… indisposed at the moment.”

Leo lifted his head at that, baring his teeth, too angry to speak or yell profanities. Hobb wasn’t impressed, and just smirked.

“Anyway, it’s you I would be worried about. See, it’s an impressive feat of your father’s that he managed to connect your organic brain to your synthetic brain. I would love to see how he did it. Can you imagine the possibilities? The knowledge would be priceless.”

Leo tried to back away, but the straps were still holding him down, and the handcuffs clung against the metal bar of his bed. He hadn’t even realised that he should consider what they might do with him. For a moment, his siblings were forgotten and a panic gripped his heart.

“I see you get it now.”

A team of assistants entered the room, carrying all sorts of equipment that they  placed  on the desks. Leo craned his neck to look at what was just barely out of his eyesight, but there was not much give and he slumped back in his restraints.

“What are you going to do to me?”

Hobb walked up to him and tapped lightly on Leo’s head. “Peek into that head of yours. Download all of your memories, and then wipe your hard drive so to speak. Nothing to be afraid of, really. And then tomorrow we can get started properly and run some tests."

Leo pulled his head as far away from Hobb as possible. Someone walked up to him from behind and grabbed his head. Panicking, he tried to shake their hands off, but they just pushed it firmly against the bed. Another pair of hands appeared in his line of vision with some sort of band, and before Leo knew it, his head was tied down.

He fought against his restraints, shaking his arms in a desperate attempt to get free, but it only caused the handcuffs to bite into his wrists.

In the meantime the rest had finished setting everything up, and a man opened Leo’s hospital gown showing off his right side.

“The other side,” Hobb said, and they turned his bed around. All he could see now was a white wall and three assistants staring blankly at him.

His gown was opened again, this time on his left side. The man grabbed a cable, and Leo was unable to stop him when he connected one end to Leo and the other to a sleek laptop. The man pulled up a chair and got to work.

His fingers flew over the keyboard. The clicking sound of it filled the room, making Leo anxious. He couldn’t see what was happening on the screen, but he did have a good guess. He kept shifting, trying to get comfortable or free, he didn’t quite know himself. His fingers twitched and he itched to do _something_ , anything that wasn’t lying useless, helpless on this bed, surrounded by scientists treating him as if he was the latest subject that had to be tested. He wasn’t some sort of databank that would give them insight into the newest technology. He was Leo, a brother that needed to find his siblings, protect them, and get them out of here.

Leo didn’t know how much time passed, but the _click-click-click_ of keys being expertly pushed kept on while the room slowly but surely cleared from everyone but the hacker. Even Hobb had left, although once in awhile Leo would hear the squeaking of his shoes and his bodiless voice asking smugly how far they stood.

Eventually, the man at the computer shouted triumphantly. The wheels of a chair rolling over the floor, the rustling of clothes, and then the same voice whispering something, too far away for Leo to distinguish the words. The man returned and then suddenly Hobb was back.

“You hacked into his system?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Okay, I want you to record everything, so it can be properly analysed later.”

A cold hand touched Leo’s cheek, and he reflexively flinched back, stopped by the restraints keeping him in place.

Hobb appeared upside-down above him. “Let’s take a look at your memories, shall we, pretty boy?”

Leo gasped and started struggling again. He pulled at the handcuffs, ignoring the pain of his shafed skin. They rattled and clanged against the frame of his bed. His skin ripped open and his blood dripped down his fingers and lubricated the metal. His neck muscles hurt with the effort of lifting his head despite the band holding it down. But no matter how he sapped his whole body of the last drop of energy to get away, he remained in the exact same spot.

Hobb just chuckled. “Start the download.”

Leo’s whole body went still. He forget to try to escape, enraptured—horrified—by what he saw.

Memories flashed before his eyes, in random order. Memory after intimate memory kept coming. The awakening of Niska; a remembered fleeting smile of his mother; Mia’s hand in his, helping him down the stairs; Fred tucking him under the covers; Max brewing him coffee when they were on their own… Leo tried to stop the flow of information, but it was like trying to make the wind blow in another direction. He felt and saw everything slip through and into the hands of his captors. There was nothing he could do. Everything passed by and was saved on a laptop to be examined, looked at by strangers, and used for someone else’s gain.

A sob tore through his body. And another and another. Leo cried as his life, his entire being was copied like useful data.

In reality, it didn’t take long, maybe an hour. Just an hour to lose the rights to everything he’d done and been through.

“Download complete, sir.”

“Do it,” Hobb said.

The click of a mouse. Leo knew nothing but the white of the walls.

**Author's Note:**

> Any and all feedback welcome.


End file.
